Posts Tagged ‘RT News’

RT News and Sputnik International are news services funded by the Russian government. They are said to be waging “information warfare” against the United States.

RT America and Sputnik International have been ordered to register as foreign agents, the only foreign news services that have been ordered to do so. What this means is that they will be required to disclose their sources of funds and other details of their operations.

The FBI is investigating Sputnik. Google has changed its algorithm to “de-rank” RT and Sputnik in Google searches. Twitter has banned advertising by RT and Google.

None of these things prevent RT or Sputnik from reporting their version of the news or making their reports available to Americans. We’re not like the old Soviet Union, where you could be arrested for listening to the Voice of America.

And, in one respect, the United States is more liberal than the Russian federation. Radio Free Europe and the Voice of America lost their Russian broadcast licenses in 2012 and 2014, but Sputnik still has a radio station in Washington, D.C.

The anti-Russia campaign is intended to brand Americans as unpatriotic if they work for RT or Sputnik, appear on their programs or even watch their programs.

I’ve linked to RT News videos in previousposts. What does that make me? Am I unpatriotic?

I think an American who listens to or watches RT or Sputnik is like a Russian who watches or listens to the Voice of America or Radio Free Europe. The U.S. government has an ulterior motive in funding these two news services. At the same time, they provide Russians with information and ideas they wouldn’t get from their domestic broadcasters.

Established U.S. broadcasters have a limited range of viewpoints they regard as acceptable. I never noticed this until my own thinking moved outside the range of the acceptable. So if there’s something on RT News I think is interesting or worthwhile, even though it might not be acceptable to PBS or CNN, I’ll link to it.. That’s my right as a free American.

This interview with alleged ISIS fighters was broadcast last Nov. 1, but it’s one more thing that’s new to me.

Its significance is the claim of RT News (formerly Russia Today) to have exclusively interviewed ISIS fighters in the field, a remarkable accomplishment if true.

But a number of things in the interview should have raised alarm bells before the broadcast.

The supposed ISIS fighters, located in a Lebanese village near the Syrian border, say they are a “sleeper cell” in Lebanon, who will be activated when the time comes.

Why would members of a “sleeper cell” alert the Lebanese government to their existence by giving interviews? It doesn’t make sense. Advertising a sleeper cell defeats the purpose of having a sleeper cell.

Then, too, the interviewees either disagree with ISIS practice or don’t understand it.

The so-called Islamic State in Iraq and Syria beheads journalists, but the interviewees follow the mainstream Islamic teaching that journalists are messengers and so should be spared. ISIS murders Christians, Shiite Muslims and people of other faiths, but the interviewees say it is impractical to establish a Caliphate in Lebanon because it is a nation of many religions.

I think the young men who claim to speak for ISIS are intentionally deceiving the reporter, or they are ISIS sympathizers who don’t fully understand the ISIS ideology.

Another reason, besides RT News’ sponsorship by the Russian government, to take RT News broadcasts with a grain of salt.